


her ichor runs red

by D1r3w011_11_w1nt3rr0s3s



Category: Avatar: Legend of Korra
Genre: Angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-30
Updated: 2018-04-30
Packaged: 2019-04-29 15:27:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 879
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14475624
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/D1r3w011_11_w1nt3rr0s3s/pseuds/D1r3w011_11_w1nt3rr0s3s
Summary: Even gods with wings can fall; Korra just flew too high, too fast.





	her ichor runs red

**Author's Note:**

> This is my very first fanfic and I hope you liked it! Legend of Korra holds a special place in my heart and I initially wasn’t too sure about posting a fanfic about it because I probably wouldn’t be able to do the characters justice. 
> 
> “her ichor runs red” is based off Icarus and the sun. Also, Korra does think of suicide in this fic. I tried approaching this as respectfully as I could, but if you feel like I've misrepresented it in this story, feel free to comment and I'll try to fix it.
> 
> I would really love some feedback :)

Here she is, standing at the edge of the world and all she can see are the elements that she will never bend again.

Faint sunlight trickles through the clouds, dripping a path across the ocean beneath her. The seas rock back and forth like a gentle lullaby, but she can't rest. She won't, with her grief still howling across the icy plains. After. . .after him (she defeated him, he's gone, he's dead. . . so why can't she still say his goddamned _name_?) she'd clung onto air like a child would a toy in the midst of a nightmare.

The nightmare's ended, but she still tastes blood in her mouth every time she wakes and her body is still frozen in a coffin of cold sweat in the dead of the night. It takes time and shaky, trembling breaths to convince herself that it happened, that the past is not her present. She is alive, she has survived and fought and won. She is the victor.

Growing up, she'd played out hundreds of different scenarios of her future as the Avatar. They had all involved a nameless, shadowy person that she would engage in an epic battle and prevail over. A clean, easy defeat. No strings attached. Well, from everywhere she heard, strings were still unravelling, tangling into a mess that many were still trying to untangle. She can't even help. Who is she, if she can't even put out the fire whose flames she'd fanned? What kind of Avatar fails at their first true fight? Aang had defeated Ozai and he hadn't even spent years honing elements like she had. _Half-baked Avatar_.

What is she, without a world to save and powers to save them with? Being the Avatar was something she's been dreaming and training for as soon as she could walk. Bending earth, fire and water was intrinsic and natural to her as breathing. And now. . .now she's still trying to wrap her head around the jagged, empty spaces they've left.

There's no name for something like her; she's been called " _Avatar_ " longer than she has been called Korra. She doesn't know how to be an Avatar-less Korra. But all she can do now is try ( _fail_ ) to function bending like a normal air bender. Be normal (but how do gods continue when they've fallen to earth?). Normal isn't Korra; from day one she's been destined for something greater, her fate irrevocably tied to millions of others. The loss of her gifts has brutally severed them in a single blow.

Perhaps those lives are now being tied to another Avatar.

Her fists clench at the finality of it. Years spent training, dreaming, fighting, falling out of her reach like the single tear down the cliff. Gone in less than minute. She watches the sunlight illuminate the teardrop as it falls, as it rejoins the sea. It seems like it would a sort of peaceful end. She's fully aware, of course, that that wouldn't be like that for her.

It would be messy but quick. There and then gone. Maybe the next Avatar would do a better job than her.

Brutal, perhaps to the people who care for her, but necessary. The world doesn't need a half-baked Avatar looking after them. If she couldn't even protect herself, then how can she protect them? How can she look them in the eye knowing that they're probably waiting for her life to bleed out? How can she face them knowing that she's already dead to them?

She almost wants to laugh. Her worth to the eyes of the world is based upon how well she can bend the elements. They will always believe the Avatar to be an immortal marble god, with ichor flowing through her veins. Oh, she had tried, has trying been her entire life to be that. Look where that got her.

The fire that burned within her, fueled by a hopeful sort of determination - doused. Her water's evaporated and the earth hard and unyielding to her touch. Gone. Just like that.

Rivers run red under her skin, a whole network of threads holding her together. Amon could on toy and tug on them as he pleased. Anyone who was like him could. She tries to breathe; tries to make the air flow in and out of her lungs like water. He's the only one (but there could be more). Closing her eyes, she tries to listen to the call of the sea. It's pointless, beyond stupid, but she wants to try.

Nothing. No pull of the tides beneath her, no murmur of hidden power lurking beneath her skin.

She parts her mouth to scream, to drown out the roar of the thoughts in her head, but no sound comes out. Tears stream down her face; water she can't bend, _control_ , slipping away. Korra sinks to her knees, hugging her arms tightly around her legs.

Burying her head into her knees, the god mourns. The air rages in the distance, phantom fingers stirring the waters, reaching for the fire of the sun. But even gods with wings can fall; Korra just flew too high, too fast. Born to the skies, haloed in gold. An untameable, untouchable being (or so they thought).

Well, here she is.

Still falling.

 


End file.
